U.S. Pat. No. Des 371,154, incorporated by reference in its entirety, discloses a sports pennant shaped light display unit comprising of neon lights of various colors. Conventionally, neon illumination only allowed for a limited range of colors and limited design functions. The spectrum of neon lights is limited to 26 colors. The cost of manufacturing neon illuminated units is expensive and a major obstacle for shipping and distribution. Neon lighting has become outdated and obsolete. LED lighting provided an improved system for providing light displays. The LEDs can be programmed individually or in groups comprising a plurality of LEDs. LED lighting provides for higher visibility, versatility, recognition, wider range of color, and brightness or dimness of illumination than traditional lighting. The spectrum of LED lighting includes over 30,000 different colors. The cost of LED lighting technology is significantly less than conventional lighting, and the lifespan is considerably longer.
Traditionally, the small size of LEDs have provided for development of LED based display systems. A two dimensional array of individually controlled LEDs can be used to display words and images. LEDs can provide the light source for many display systems.
There are many types of LED signs in the conventional art. One type of LED sign is a fixed word sign made from a circuit board with LED's arranged in the circuit board (ie., to form letters to make a word) in a road sign. For example, LED signs are made for street addresses on houses or businesses, menu displays, personalized license plates, information (OPEN, CLOSED, EXIT, etc). These signs are made of a mechanical alphanumeric character arranged and attached to a substrate to hold them in place.
Further, traditional LED signs incorporate individual circuit boards with alphanumeric characters formed by LEDs placed in appropriate pattern on each individual circuit board to form the character. LEDs used in characters can be different colors and patters. U.S. Patent Publication No. 2003/0167666 discloses a fixed character, LED alpha-numeric message display system consisting of individual circuit boards where each circuit card has LEDs placed on the surface with their light source in an arrangement of an alphanumeric character. The LED's are arranged in a pattern, which represents numerals, letters, characters, or other symbols. The circuit boards are electromechanically connected to one another where each circuit card buses power and ground from one circuit board to the next. The character boards are arranged in an order to form words and numbers by placing the character circuit boards abut to one another. These traditional LED signs are inflexible as they do not provide programmable, scrolling or customized displays, among other discrepancies.
Further, traditional LED characters are incorporated into a circuit board encased in clear plastic extrusion or co-extrusion with caps to seal the ends. The enclosure mechanically support and retain the character circuit boards. The enclosures are functional only to encase the circuit board (like a cover), but are not operationally lexible and not customizable to coordinate with the LEDs.
Embodiments of the present invention address at least the drawbacks associated with conventional LED lighting and display system, therein.